by Brian FoulksR3 Contributor *This article appeared first at Syncopated Hustle Words escape my very sense of being civil. Civility awakes to embedded anger that is ready to engage any and all who make comical commentary about the death of Trayvon Martin. For me this extends past Trayvon’s death into my own personal world and the world of many fathers with teenage sons. The reality is that this is and could have been the very same verdict that can so... Read more

I recently finished reading The Faith Instinct by Nicholas Wade. In one of the book’s concluding chapters Wade writes about American Civil Religion, the idea that the history and symbols of the United States have resulted in a sort of pseudo-state religion. The theory is not Wade’s, but it was the first time I had come across it (my history reading over the last fifteen years has been mostly limited to the Pagan/Magickal/Occult sphere). Over the last few years the practice of American... Read more

It’s hard being a feminist and visiting a new church.  I’ve recently moved to Texas from California and I’m looking for a church to attend.  There are many things I love about church: corporate worship, talks with people of faith, gatherings where friendships are built, and opportunities to serve and to learn. I also love to sing, and my not-ready-for-primetime voice would love to join a choir with and contribute to other people’s worship experience. In my past, I’ve been... Read more

by Giovanni Neal R3 Contributor I actually wrote about the George Zimmerman trial last week.  However, just before submitting the piece I realized that I was jumping the gun and needed to hear all of the evidence available before giving my opinion.  I take the law seriously and believe it should be applied equally, justly and fairly. The litmus test for a conviction in a criminal trial is reasonable doubt; if it’s present then the verdict should be not guilty. Better a... Read more

Evangelical theology in the United States is often racialized. Racialization pertains to race’s impact on education, health care, job placement, place of living, urban planning, and so forth. When I speak of Evangelical theology as racialized, I am not thinking primarily of what we say and write about race, but of what we don’t articulate and possibly assume. In other words, it is not always the black print, but the white backdrop on the page that makes a theology white.... Read more

by Earle Fisher R3 Contributor As a pastor, I deem it a superior sin to cultivate an environment conducive to shallow theology, religious buffoonery and ecclesiastical theatrics.  The legacy of my religious tradition (prophetic Christianity) has sustained countless people through the most paralyzing and perplexing of circumstances of slavery, oppression, economic instability and even death.  Being nurtured and reared (albeit often times indirectly) by such a rich tradition has enabled me to prioritize the necessity of a well-balanced life of... Read more

Daniel White Hodge is a producer with a Ph.D. In his twenties he had production credits on Bone Thugs-N-Harmony’s first album, E 1999 Eternal, as well as helping to score the first two seasons of New York Undercover. With a Ph.D. from Fuller Graduate School of Intercultural Studies, he is now the director of the Center for Youth Ministry Studies and assistant professor of youth ministry at North Park University in Chicago. He is also a contributor to the Rhetoric Race... Read more

Soon after the 2012 election a Perspectives editor asked me to write about the diminished role overt faith had in presidential campaign discourse. He thought I shared his disappointment in the Obama campaign’s reluctance to use Christian rhetoric and (his description) “almost total disregard for the Christian community.”  So writes Douglas Koopman of Calvin College, in his A Great President’s Second Inaugural Address, an “As We See It” in the current issue of Perspectives. And I am the aforementioned Perspectives... Read more

For centuries, European Christians (and their American descendants) mostly categorized religious systems according to their similarities and differences vis-à-visChristianity. There were monotheistic or highly evolved religions versus “primitive” or “idolatrous” religions. There were universal religions versus ethnic, narrow-minded religions (that formulation demoted Judaism in comparison with the previous sentence). Some of those taxonomic schemes suggested a positive appraisal of other religious systems, but only to the extent that they resembled Christianity. [The above mostly represents a very loose and incomplete summary... Read more

When it comes to God and country, white evangelicals report the most intense patriotic feelings in a new poll, with more than two-thirds (68 percent) saying they are extremely proud to be an American. That figure was markedly higher than for white mainline Protestants (56 percent), minority Christians (49 percent), Catholics (48 percent) and religiously unaffiliated Americans (39 percent), according to the study, conducted by the Washington-based Public Religion Research Institute in partnership with Religion News Service. White evangelicals are... Read more